© NELE STRÖBEL

Ceramics: flottierend*e welle 2001 (floating wave)

The sculpture "Flottierende Welle" (floating wave) was made in 2001 for the exhibition "ceramics - Form und Phantastik in der Europäischen Bildhauerkunst" and is now finally seated in the garden of the European patent agency in Vienna.
The 32 modules of this 9² m piece are quartered segments of convex and concave round / offset knobbed 1² m plates at right angles to each other. Their rhythmic arrangement creates a floating wave which seems to hover a few centimeters above the ground, defying gravity.

*"flottierend" - or "floating" - because the ceramic material seems to have frozen while in movement. It spreads out both horizontally and vertically as if it could still move or be modeled. In this sense, "flottierend" embodies the state of the material before and during its transformation into a sculpture.